See Spot Run (2001)

One of the biggest challenges for cast and crew during the course of the filming was to keep from laughing out loud at many of the truly hilarious sight and sound gags constantly being created.

David Arquette recounts how Anthony Anderson "just kept stealing the show, he was so funny. We'd just jump around and have a great time. Anthony is really hilarious, always breaking everybody up with his constant ad-libbing. I suggested that he and I break dance in one scene and we pretty much had everybody on the floor."

"My character Gordon thinks he's real cool," Arquette continues, "but he's not. He's kind of goofy and I enjoy that. I enjoy having people laugh at me, being the joke, almost as much as having the joke on other people."

Of course, for director John Whitesell there was also the daunting task of incorporating new materials, which were constantly being added to the story. "With all the additional stuff written on almost a daily basis," says Whitesell, "there were suddenly many more gags, stunts and physical comedy elements added on and the subsequent challenge of keeping it all on schedule.

"Because I have done a lot of television," Whitesell continues, "I didn't feel it would be that much more of a challenge to shoot it all, but I hadn't ever done this much work with animals and kids together. As we kept adding action for the dog, we ended up with probably 50% more material stunt stuff than there we had initially planned. There was a kind of snowball effect which made things pretty hectic."

In the final analysis everybody agreed that Whitesell was up to the challenge. Paul Sorvino gives the director credit for encouraging the prolitic outpouring of comedy, which permeates the film. "The script is amusing on paper," says Sorvino, "but because of John Whitesell's creation of an atmosphere in which creativity is king, the film has actually surpassed what was on the page."

"He's a very good director, "agrees Michael Clarke Duncan. "He is very decisive and doesn't do a lot of takes. He is someone who knows exactly what he wants."

Producer Bob Simonds predicted that "See Spot Run" will be a movie for the whole family, and indeed, it is. "The movie is rated PG," he says. "We wanted it to be a movie that people will be eager to bring their kids to but also cool enough that it doesn't turn off a very discriminating teen audience."

David Arquette concurs. "It's clearly fun for the whole family," he says. "It has a lot of different elements, from silly to touching."

Whitesell concludes by describing what he considers to be the essence of the film. "I think it's ultimately a movie about finding your soul," he says. "Gordon accepts responsibility and finds out what he really cares about. He finds that he's not afraid to have a child and a woman in his life that he can commit to. And the dog finds out that there is a family out there for him. I think it's about finding what you want and it's about commitment. That's what makes a family. We are scared of things in our lives but we don't need to be. If we would just learn about them and trust other people and take a chance. we could be really happy. It may seem a little simplistic but I think that's the essence, the soul of what it's about."

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